Humble THQ Bundle threatens to ruin the brand’s reputation (Updated)

Co-founder responds to Ars and says indies are still the Bundle's core.

(See the bottom of this piece for an update from Humble Bundle co-founder John Graham)

Since its successful debut back in 2010, the Humble Bundle has built a reputation for combining little-known independent games with a popular pay-what-you-want model and platform-agnostic, DRM-free downloads. The company's latest bundle, a partnership with major publisher THQ, could ruin that reputation in one stroke by abandoning some of the core principles that made the Humble Bundle so refreshingly different two years ago.

The Humble THQ Bundle launching today offers buyers a number of the publisher's legacy titles—Darksiders, Company of Heroes (and its Opposing Fronts and Tales of Valor expansions), Metro 2033, and Red Faction®: Armageddon—along with a copy of Saints Row: The Third for those who fork out more than the average sale price of the bundle. While past Humble Bundles have prided themselves on offering their games as DRM-free downloads for Windows, Mac, or Linux, though, the THQ bundle breaks precedent by providing games only as Steam-activated Windows downloads.

The new bundle also slightly tweaks the pure pay-what-you-want structure of past bundles, setting a $1 minimum purchase price. A similar threshhold was put in place for purchasers who wanted access to Steam keys during the Humble Indie Bundle 4 in order to prevent people "legitimizing" fraudulent Steam accounts with a bevy of cheap games.

I definitely see the logic of this new bundle from THQ's point of view. The publisher gets to trade on the Humble Bundle's good name in order to promote older titles that aren't exactly burning up the sales charts anymore. Any additional revenue gained from what's essentially a massive pay-what-you-want sale on its back catalog is pure gravy for THQ. Plus, exposing new players to these franchises increases the potential audience for upcoming sequels like Metro: Last Light and Company of Heroes 2.

But the move makes less sense from the Humble Bundle's standpoint. The Bundle built a name for itself by promoting lesser-known, quality independent games that the creators believed in—games that deserved a wider audience than traditional set-price sales schemes or limited indie marketing budgets would allow. THQ may not be as strong as it once was, but its games hardly need the Humble Bundle's support as much as their indie brethren. Saints Row: The Third recently shipped its 5 millionth copy, thanks in part to a massive marketing campaign alongside last year's release. Using the bundle as further promotion for already successful, big-budget games is the antithesis of "humble," and it dilutes the power and impact of what it means to be part of a Humble Bundle in the first place.

The move away from DRM-free multiplatform distribution might be even more damaging to the Humble Bundle's brand. Back when the first Humble Bundle launched, cofounder Jeffrey Rosen was very open about tolerating piracy rates of up to 25 percent in order to ensure the bundle would be DRM-free. With pay-what-you-want prices as little as 1¢, Rosen said he realized that most pirates were probably just getting around region-locked payment processors or pirating out of sheer laziness. "When considering any kind of DRM, we have to ask ourselves, 'How many legitimate users is it OK to inconvenience in order to reduce piracy?'" he wrote at the time. "The answer should be none."

While Steam may not be a huge inconvenience for gamers these days, its inconvenience level is considerably higher than "none." No doubt THQ was uncomfortable widely releasing its titles in a totally unprotected format (never mind that all its bundled titles are already widely available as cracked torrents). Less clear is why the Humble Bundle was willing to essentially sell out this core part of its DNA just to get THQ on board (Humble Bundle representatives have yet to respond to our request for comment). Perhaps tellingly, the option to donate a portion of the bundle purchase price to the Electronic Frontier Foundation has been replaced this time around with the option to donate to the Red Cross instead.

In the past, the Humble Bundle has been a boon to gamers on non-Windows platforms as well. By requiring that all bundled PC games also be available for Mac and Linux users, the Humble Bundle has led directly to new, non-Windows ports for a number of well-regarded indie games, including Bastion, Psychonauts, and Sword and Sworcery EP. The company continued its cross-platform tradition by urging a number of iOS-to-Android ports for its Humble Android Bundles and even hired a full-time Linux game porter recently to help the process along in the future.

Theoretically, this same pressure could have been brought to bear on THQ, requiring the publisher to work on Mac and Linux ports for its big-name games if it wanted access to the Humble Bundle name and sales platform. Instead, those in charge of the bundle seem perfectly OK with diluting yet another key element of the Humble Bundle experience in getting its first major publisher on board.

Building a successful brand is tough, but ruining a successful brand can be distressingly easy. By effectively ignoring many of the elements that made the Humble Bundle interesting and different in the first place, the Humble THQ Bundle risks irreparably harming what is currently a nearly unimpeachable brand in the world of game sales and distribution.

UPDATE

In a response to Ars, Humble Bundle co-founder John Graham assured users the company will "never stop creating Humble Indie Bundles... and the other bundle types we've successfully launched this year. But we’re also eager to see if our pay-what-you-want plus charity model meshes with critically acclaimed AAA content as well."

Graham said the new THQ bundle did not represent a permanent departure from the company's indie roots, and that the company may even release a third indie bundle this year. "This year has also been a year of many experiments for us that fall outside the traditional Humble Indie Bundle framework," Graham told us. "We’re very excited to be able to offer the gaming community a massive sale with blockbuster content and raise money for charity at the same time. We will of course continue to support indies content as a core of our business."

Regarding the lack of Mac and Linux ports this time around, Graham said plainly that, "in the case of this promotion, it would not have been possible for us to deliver this blockbuster content via other means." But Graham also promised the Humble Bundle "will not cease in our quest to bring awesome content to Mac and Linux and Android," and pointed out that the Humble eBook Bundle contained the first digital publication of Neil Gaiman's graphic novel Signal to Noise.

Promoted Comments

I think the far bigger problem here is that people are taking the Humble Bundle for granted. Maybe people think that by offering Steam keys, that there won't be a DRM-free bundle this month. Maybe people feel like they are "losing" a bundle?

Does selling DRM'ed stuff ruin their reputation? Perhaps it does for anal completionists. The site is pretty clear you're getting Steam Keys for Windows. Unless you insist on owning _every_ Humble Bundle, you simply avoid this one.

Also: I've never considered the Humble Bundle to be a strong promoter of "lesser-known" indie titles. It's been a strong promoter of more _popular_ indie-titles. Darwinia? Amnesia? Jamestown? Binding of Isaac? Trine? Braid? Bit Trip Beat? Pretty much every title I've seen on Humble Bundle is something I've heard about long before. If I want "lesser known", I turn to Indie Royale.

I also don't think the Humble Bundle has a lot of "pull", to the extent that they can make THQ port games to Linux and Mac. I might be wrong, but the HB tends to raise a couple million, that gets divided between multiple devs, charities, and itself. I don't think that gives it a lot of bargaining power with a large publisher, unless the publisher is doing a fire sale as it sinks (in which case I doubt it's in a position to port their library).

Humblebundle.com has been expanding their offerings for a while now as we saw with the music and book bundles. This is just another offering from them. If you don't like this offering, just accept that it's not for you, and wait for the next indie bundle.

Good games and a great price... unless you're on a Mac or Linux, then it's a big ol' nothing. And if you're anti-DRM it's a no-go regardless of the platform. Not hard to figure out why people are upset. It's been explained several times.

182 Reader Comments

I absolutely do not understand the outrage here. Here's how I see it - Humble Bundle and THQ are working together to do something good for charity and the gaming community. By offering AAA games, they might even be able to raise MORE money for charity with this bundle. So it's not indie games this time - so what? I DO NOT CARE. Good for you, Humble Bundle and THQ.

Where's the holiday spirit people? Are we really complaining about this? Shame on Kyle Orland and Ars Technica for writing such a negative article about a good thing.

This is basically just a Steam Sale. THQ could have done same PWYW sale through other channels, even the charity donations. They didn't need to use the Humble Bundle group for this, and the Humble Bundle didn't need to partner with THQ. I don't know if they're advertising this through Steam but that venue alone could probably draw more eyes (and therefore dollars) than HIB watchers could account for. To a lot of people, the Humble Bundles stands for a strongly anti-DRM ideology, a strongly cross-platform ideology, a strongly indie-promoting ideology, or all of the above. That is undoubtedly what has driven a lot of their sales in the past and engendered the goodwill of their customers. For THQ and the charities this is all gravy. For the Humble Bundle it's a significant step backwards. Yes, THQ is in financial trouble and Child's Play and the Red Cross need all the money we can give them. That doesn't mean there are no downsides, no grounds for complaint, or no legitimate issues with this move.

I absolutely do not understand the outrage here. Here's how I see it - Humble Bundle and THQ are working together to do something good for charity and the gaming community. By offering AAA games, they might even be able to raise MORE money for charity with this bundle. So it's not indie games this time - so what? I DO NOT CARE. Good for you, Humble Bundle and THQ.

Where's the holiday spirit people? Are we really complaining about this? Shame on Kyle Orland and Ars Technica for writing such a negative article about a good thing.

Not to mention all the commenters here rolling in to bash them HB and THQ, as if they should somehow be ashamed of themselves for raising money for charity "the wrong way".

What annoys me is that there were no DRM-free options and, far worse, no Linux and Mac ports. I realise that porting isn't always easy, especially if the game and/or engine is designed around DirectX, but if there is one thing consistently awesome about the Humble Bundles, it's the multiplatform support.

THQ - port your games to Mac and Linux, and I'll gladly buy them again, even if they are all Steam-bound (though DRM-free would be nice).

My priorities are the opposite: DRM-free is very important, Linux support is nice to have (and I say that as a Linux user).

I'm primarily a Linux user, but I do keep a Windows partition around for gaming as well. I'd love to see the day when Linux gaming has enough support that I can ditch Windows entirely (hopefully it will happen before Win7 becomes unsupported), but I recognize that it may not always be feasible to port existing games that were not written with cross-platform development in mind. For new games in development, developers should definitely have a multi-platform mindset from the start.

There's no excuse for keeping the DRM though. That should be non-negotiable as a matter of principle. I happily support DRM-free, non-indie, fixed-price Windows games on GOG.com, and I would be even happier to to support the same type of games in a pay-what-you-want-and-give-to-charity bundle. I might still get this bundle and just give most of the money to the charities, but I won't be paying as much as I have for previous bundles (usually $42, because I like the number 42).

Humblebundle.com has been expanding their offerings for a while now as we saw with the music and book bundles. This is just another offering from them. If you don't like this offering, just accept that it's not for you, and wait for the next indie bundle.

It's a bundle made by a former big player. They could really use the money and is an offer that is honestly hard to pass. Money given here still goes to charity and that to me is the biggest part of the bundles. If you don't like that you don't get the DRM free then skip it. I'm sure they will go back to indie games next time.

My advice for those of you that are feeling confused: give all your money to charity.

Good games and a great price... unless you're on a Mac or Linux, then it's a big ol' nothing. And if you're anti-DRM it's a no-go regardless of the platform. Not hard to figure out why people are upset. It's been explained several times.

To me, it's not the fact that they have THQ games up there (actually I kind of like that because a few of those I would play, and I've no problem with some DRM.) The problem with me is more or less that they claim that THQ is a charity when it's a for-profit company. They could have at least had their programmers take the time to adjust that bit as well.

This is basically just a Steam Sale. THQ could have done same PWYW sale through other channels, even the charity donations. They didn't need to use the Humble Bundle group for this, and the Humble Bundle didn't need to partner with THQ.

Nobody *needs* HB at all. I donate to Child's Play out of conviction through other channels. But the fact is, a lot of charitable givers have HB on their radar, so this may attract them more than some other effort.

And no, this isn't a Steam Sale, because those don't go to charities at all. And there is no set price, which Steam is not equipped for.

And okay, this goes against the spirit of previous bundles on a platform and DRM level. But who really actually cares? Skip it if you don't like it. I have skipped a number of indie bundles because I thought the games were mostly atrocious, yet I look at new offerings.

HB makes clear what they are offering this time around, it's not deceptive. If a bunch of evangelists get their panties in a knot over the lack of purity, so be it. I think the net effect is positive for everyone involved.

It appalls me not that Humble Bundle has done this, but that such a large part of the gamer community seems to be up in arms about this whole situation. We should be happy that we're getting this at all! i for one am very excited and grateful for the opportunity to play these games at such an unrealistically low price.

Also, I hardly believe that one departure from the formula (which the co-founder quoted as an experiment) is enough for gamers to be turned off from the Humble Bundle. Maybe if they permanently turned in this direction I can understand the outrage, but this one time caused one commenter to swear off the Humble Bundle.

I've always seen the Humble Bundle project as a vessel for great deals on great games for a great cause. This particular bundle in no way compromises any of those values, so all these negative reactions confuse me.

At the time I'm writing this, Darksiders alone is worth five times the average price of the bundle ($5.43).

I think the main focus of the article should have been how more studios can find the ideal price point through this method. To be honest the price point is ballooning to be $100 per game. $50 base game and $50 "Seasons Pass". So essentially one game is now 70 - 100$.

What they need to do is how to achieve maximum market saturation as quickly as possible. As the first 2 months in releasing a game matter.

THQ is hurting for the money, and I am a huge fan of THQ Company of Heroes. Even though I own most of the games in the bundle. I bought it again to support the company.

I've always seen the Humble Bundle project as a vessel for great deals on great games for a great cause. This particular bundle in no way compromises any of those values, so all these negative reactions confuse me.

No, it compromises the values of DRM-free multiplatform games by independent developers.

Do you disagree that those values have been a part of the stated purpose of past Humble Indie Bundles, or do you simply not think they're important?

SoulForge wrote:

People need to quit complaining. I don't see any issue with this HB at all. If you don't like it or find it offensive then that is fine. Don't buy it.

You know, "If you don't like it, don't buy it, but you shouldn't complain about things you don't like" is stupid damn logic at the best of times.

But it's ESPECIALLY hard to take with a straight face coming from somebody who just now signed up for an Ars account JUST TO COMPLAIN ABOUT PEOPLE WHO ARE COMPLAINING.

Honestly, having both AAA bundles locked by "reasonable" antipiracy measures, or tied to Steam or other services, while CONTINUING to offer Indie bundles totally DRM free, I think that's completely OK.

I also do not see the $1 minimum in any way a problem. Someone has to fork up the bandwidth and account management for getting you the bundle, so I imaging the for payed $1.50, $1 goes exclusively to steam, and the rest is given to the developers. That's totally fair geven the size of these games and long-term account management, especially since this may generate a significant number of first time steam users.

I'd have long ago suggested a $1 PER TITLE minimum for the bundle myself, though, putting that one good title out there as the bonus for paying more than the median-at-the-time price does help to keep the price moving up over the promotion period. There has to be SOME level of respect for the content you;re paying for, a penny simply isn't it...

I don't really get the outrage either. It's a bunch of great games for as little as a dollar (or about $5.50 if you want Saints Row the Third - and you do - it's a blast). I will agree that the branding could have perhaps been tweaked.

And for those complaining about multi-platform - these weren't multi-platform before, and they aren't now, so you've lost nothing really.

It's just a shame I already have Saints Row, Metro 2033 (a good game, but it's an on-rails shooter in more ways than one!) and Company of Heroes (but not the expansions and not on Steam). Not sure if Darksiders and Red Faction are interesting enough for me to bother with.

I always viewed the Humble Bundle as just "pay what you want", but it just happened to be targetting indie stuff previously. It's still a sort of "pay what you want", just not indie. I don't see a big deal about this.

What I do see a big deal with is DRM as well as shortened single-player campaigns (unless it's like an RPG or such).

I've come to view my payment to "play" a game the same way I view paying for a movie ticket to see a movie one time. I'm under no delusions that Steam will be around, that my account won't get hacked and take over, that something dumb may happen to wipe out my game catalog ... it's all just data.

Sure, I can replay the game as much as I want. But, I'm at that age where 1 play through of a game, just as 1 sitting of a movie, is good enough for me.

Over Steam's Autumn Sale, I picked up Amnesia & Fear 3 for $4.99 each. I played through both. I enjoyed the experience the same way I enjoyed watching a movie. If the games disappeared from my library tomorrow, I wouldn't be upset.

I guess what this emphasizes more is that maybe Steam should focus on a game rental system. I'm willing to pay $5-10 to play a game once. Not keen on paying $60. If I paid $60 for some of the games I played from Steam, I'd be majorly upset. But, having bought most for $10 or less, I feel I got my money's worth.

What's with all the troll posts saying "durr hurr I don't understand why people are upset"?

The article is pretty clear on why, and people in comments have also expressed their concerns.

Learn to fucking read.

And other people disagree with the concerns or find the article lacking. That's when they write comments, you know, in the "Reader Comments" section. I suggest you just skip the comments if the article confirms how you feel.

What's with all the troll posts saying "durr hurr I don't understand why people are upset"?

The article is pretty clear on why, and people in comments have also expressed their concerns.

Learn to fucking read.

And other people disagree with the concerns or find the article lacking. That's when they write comments, you know, in the "Reader Comments" section. I suggest you just skip the comments if the article confirms how you feel.

Disagreeing is different from saying they don't understand. I disagree that this is a totally win-win situation, but I at least understand why other people consider it to be. They're telling my why that is in the comments. They don't prioritize certain aspects of the HB like I do. That's okay, to each their own. Unlike some people, I can apparently read the article and the comments and understand what's being said. When they jump in and say "I don't get why people are upset, how dare they??!?!" what they're saying is that their priorities are different. Supporting charities or supporting THQ or supporting new directions for the HB are all things they agree with. But they're saying it in a way that makes it look like nobody else's priorities could possibly be justified. After two and a half pages of explanations from people about why they see this as a bad thing, to still say "I don't get it" shows that they either aren't paying attention or aren't giving the other opinions a fair shake.

Myself, I don't have a problem with receiving DRM-infested offerings for something like this. I'm giving to charity. Getting anything back in return is a bonus.

Granted, I've appreciated the freeness and cross-platform nature of past bundles as a concept, but the reality is that I've made little use of them; I've typically ended up grabbing my steam keys like a good little robot as having everything available from one place is just so handy.

The only problem I have with the whole affair is that the default settings bias the share heavily towards THQ and away from the Red Cross and HB itself, but a mouse twitch soon solved that.

Passing 149k sales now at an average of $5.48; I wonder how much of the total is going to the Red Cross.

I feel that Humble Bundle is in some way tainted by this. Not only does THQ not need the help, the DRM and lack of Mac support go directly against everything I've percieved Humble Bundle to stand for.

It's nice that giving 100% of the purchase to Child's Play is still an option, but I noticed that the Electronic Frontier Foundation is not listed anymore. Instead, it's the Red Cross. Wonder if THQ nixed EFF for this?

In any case, I'll give my money straight to Child's Play and skip this Bundle.

I beleive they nixed the EFF a few bundles ago, nothing to do with THQ.

THQ seems to be in a huge financial distress (they didn't cancel Stalker 2 just to annoy us), losing money every semester, being short on treasury and not having any significant release until at least March. The recent news were quite bad.

They didn't have many options, the more obvious were :- bankrupt- sell the company- sell some IPs to bigger publishers

A "pay what you want" sale to get funds to try to be able to wait until the release of South Park / Metro Last Light / COH2 is an audacious move.

Is this bundle a betrayal from Humble Bundle ? Well, DRM and Windows-only sure are a shame, but was there any option ? Could THQ even afford to pay the studios to port these games on Linux ?

When I first heard about this bundle, I didn't see the guys behind Humble Bundle as a bunch of turncloaks. I saw that bundle more like a hand given to a company in need. And I gave them some money, not only because the games in the bundle are fine, but because I want that South Park game to happen and I'd like to play more Warhammer 40k games in the near future.

Call it a knee-jerk reaction if you like, and indeed I do already have Steam and a pile of paid-for games on it but I supported the humble bundle as an ideology and not for the games I purchased, some of which have never even been installed.

Now that the DRM-free ideology is gone, there is no inspiration for me to give them my business.

And other people disagree with the concerns or find the article lacking. That's when they write comments, you know, in the "Reader Comments" section.

But there's a difference between arguing, sensibly, that you disagree with the premise of the article and writing obnoxious "I JUST DON'T UNNERSTAAAAAAAAAAND" posts that simply dismiss the argument outright and pretend nobody supporting it is making any sense.

That's not an argument, it's just contradiction.

hansmuff wrote:

I suggest you just skip the comments if the article confirms how you feel.

Learn to fucking discuss.

I believe those two sentences are pretty contradictory. You're suggesting the comments section should only be made up of people who disagree with the article? That's not much of a discussion.

There are people in this thread who are making good points about why they disagree with the premise of the article. They are not the several dozen people who just signed up for an account today to post minor variations on "I don't get what the big deal is."

Isn't allowing "pay what you want" sales something we as gamers have wanted major publishers to start doing for years? So THQ goes ahead and does exactly that - and we cry foul because *gasp* major publisher!

Sure, I'm good with that, but there was no need to dilute the humble 'brand' to bring that to gamers. THQ could have launched their own (or maybe not if their troubles are as serious) or Humble could have marketed it under a different brand.

Obviously Humble means different things to different people, but cross-platform drm-free has always been a core point to me. (And I do miss the EFF too!)

Finally registered to post a comment, after lurking around the comments in Ars for a few years. In fact, it was Ars that originally let me know about the bundles. Anyway, for me, this new direction is a real shame, a real departure from what I want from the brand. Humble *Indie* Bundle. Indie, that's the core, that's what it's about.

Not interested, won't buy. I haven't had an email from them either, I'm hoping they're just a bit embarrassed to email out.

Personally I am pretty dissapointed they didn't at least keep the DRM free requirement. There is no reason THQ couldn't release a DRM free version of these older games without harming themselves. These games are old, past prime, and have seen the majority of their sales AND the majority of their piracy. To backslide on that requirement, in the one instance where you might possibly convince a big publisher like THQ that is makes sense, is a major sell out of one their purported core beliefs.

The reason I support GOG.com and make it my first choice outlet for games is that they get that DRM does little to perhaps nothing to prevent any "lost sales" and really only inconveniences paying customers. We have seen so many examples of this lately. I have over 300 games on Steam and over 40 games on GOG.com and I don't have a huge discretionary spending budget. I pay for the games and other products I enjoy but I won't support draconian DRM and while I am not opposed to Steamworks as a form of DRM I will not support this particular bundle b/c of their complete bending over to accommodate THQ. They have prostituted themselves to make more money with bigger publishers and bigger games, throwing out all of their supposed values in the process.

If they continue the traditional multi-platform, DRM free stuff, whether indie or not, I will buy. If they are going to do this I might as well just buy on a Steam sale.

EDIT: Also a damn shame they removed the EFF as an option. They are one of my favorite non-profit groups and the fact that THQ was able to even dictate that shows how far the "Humble" bundle guys are basically selling out their values.

It's really quite simple. If you don't like the games, distribution method, etc, etc....then don't buy it! I buy these bundles to help out small devs and because I'm broke and can't afford to spend $60.00 per title. I'm not interested in any of these games but if I were I'd buy the bundle to help out THQ and get a good deal. You people are taking this whole thing WAAAAAAY too seriously. At the end of the day they are just trying to sell you games. If you don't want them for ANY reason, then DON'T BUY THEM. Don't take it so personally!

And for those complaining about multi-platform - these weren't multi-platform before, and they aren't now, so you've lost nothing really.

You are very wrong. One of the "core" values of Humble Bundle is to foster the development of Mac and/or Linux ports for indie games that didn't have them already. In fact the majority of all games released in Humble Bundles in the past were all Windows-only prior to their inclusion in said bundles, with the porting effort driven by the requirement that all bundle games be available on Windows/Mac/Linux. They even have a Linux engineer on staff to assist game developers with the porting process.

This THQ bundle sets a precedent that releasing games on all supported platforms is no longer a requirement. This is a pretty big slap in the face of anyone who has supported HB in the past for the sake of encouraging multiplatform games.

Humble Bundle at is core is a group that is trying to raise money for the greater good and with that in mind I don't care what games they provide, the core element is that you are raising money for charity. Yes this ONE humble bundle is different than the others but that in no way should tarnish Humble Bundle's drive to raise money for things that matter. I for one wasn't a fan of the music humble bundle but did I cry and moan about how I wish it had been different? No I donated because I was proud of the organization for trying new things and reaching new fan bases. Maybe with this bundle of high quality games Humble Bundle will be able to attract gamers that never gave it the time of day before, which will hopefully lead to more sales and more donations to the people that truly need it. When viewing this bundle think less of what it is doing for you and more about what your donation is doing for humanity.

What about the indie devs? The ones who took a leap of faith, the ones who risked their source of income and went great lengths to comply with the principles of the bundle. "Pay what you want, DRM free, cross platform DRM free". The Humble Bundle didn't build its reputation and fame by itself.

I would have bought this bundle if they hadn't take a free hide on the Humble Indie Bundle brand. I would even have bought Metro 2033 in a standard steam sale.

And taking the EFF out, is an absurd. Why would they do that? Because they promote digital consumer rights, free speech and privacy? THQ doesn't want to associate with that "type of people"?

Kyle Orland / Kyle is the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica, specializing in video game hardware and software. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He is based in Pittsburgh, PA.